With the new MST3K reboot dropping today, Paste Magazine ranked every episode of MST3K on one ginormous page that reportedly crashes Chrome.
I don’t agree with all their rankings (Manos: The Hands of Fate is much too low), but they’re generally in the ballpark.
In way of remembrance, here’s Joan jett covering the theme to the Mary Tyler Moore Show (“Love is All Around”) live on Letterman.
It was either that or the entirety of the “It May look Like A Walnut” episode of the Dick Van Dyke Show…
At least up through season 20…
If you were trying to construct The Most Painfully 1970s SF TV Show Ever, you might come up with The Phoenix, and never mind that it debuted in 1981.
I mean, look at the intro footage, and tell me it doesn’t reek of the 1970s:
I mean, ancient astronauts, pyramid power, ESP, big medallions and feathered hair! How much more 70s can you get?
This arrived after my “I’ll Watch Any Damn SF/F/H Show On TV” phase, and it actually came and went so quickly (only five episodes aired, including the pilot) I wasn’t even aware of it.
Someone has put up a fairly crappy quality video of the complete pilot:
Hope you like flute music. The writing isn’t very good, but Judson Scott (who I remember best as Khan’s second-in-command) is surprisingly tolerable as Hunky McSunAlien.
For more on similar subject, see Decade of Weirdness: The 1970s and Retro TV Memories: The Fantastic Journey.
That was my reaction upon reading this.
In fact, making is probably the wrong word, since it evidently premiered on SyFy tonight. (I’ve been busy.)
If you hadn’t heard of it before, it’s a Creepy Pasta about a obscure kid’s TV marionette show, except most kid’s shows don’t have characters like “The Skintaker.” And naturally, kid’s remember how creepy it was, but parents only remember them watching static.
Here’s a trailer:
And here’s someone’s interpretation of the imaginary show’s imaginary theme music:
Probably because I was searching for various clips following Gene Wilder’s death, this video about Marty Feldman’s life came up on YouTube. I thought I’d see a few minutes of it and actually ended up watching the whole thing.
Here in the U.S. Feldman is probably know mainly for appearing in Young Frankenstein, but in the UK he was revered as a radio and TV comic writing and performing genius who held his own working with many of the people who would later form Monty Python. Indeed, Feldman co-wrote the famous “Four Yorkshiremen” skit Python would later adopt as their own, and when Python first went on the air, Feldman was staring in his own Marty show on the BBC.
It’s worth a watch.
The final two books I bought from Fred Duarte’s library, at around $10 each:
Not included: The many DVDs I picked up at $1 a disc from Fred’s estate, nor the odd item I picked up at the recent Armadillocon I’ll be listing later.
Meanwhile, I have two huge book buys (that just happened to happen the same day I picked up Fred’s books) I need to catalog. So the pig is maybe 1/3rd of the way down the python…
I knew George Alec Effinger and had collected most (but not all) of the books before his untimely death in 2002. His four Planet of the Ape books (based on the short-lived live-action CBS TV show) were among the ones I lacked. (Media tie-in works are something I only pick up when they’re incredibly cheap, or when I’ve already picked up everything else.) These four are all from the estate of Fred Duarte.
There’s going to be a live MST3K Reunion concert simulcast across the country tomorrow (June 28). Here’s Mike Nelson and company to explain:
You might still be able to get tickets.
What’s a great artistic endeavor? Why that would be The Star Wars Holiday Special! Or at least the artistic challenge of same, in the eyes of one of the writers, namely the difficulty on writing for wookies to seal-honk inscrutably to each other for 20 minutes.
Also: Suspicions confirmed!
All right, so at this point, I’m going to quote The Onion’s A.V. Club, who wrote about the show — this is a quote — “I’m not convinced the special wasn’t ultimately written and directed by a sentient bag of cocaine.”
Is that what was going on with that scene?
Bruce Vilanch: Well, there was a lot of that. Absolutely, yeah. I mean, it was 1977! I think after 40 years, probably the statute of limitations has run out, as well as the cocaine.
Also this:
“I know it’s one of the worst television shows of all time. And I’ve written… Listen, I wrote “Wayne Newton at Sea World.” So I know whereof I speak.”